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Archive for the ‘Technology’ Category

February 20th, 2013

Remembering shortcuts for all of your applications is fairly tough. This keyboard concept designed by Maxim Mezentsev & Aleksander Suhih solves that issue. The keyboard keys would show custom buttons for each program that you use (Photoshop, Illustrator, Indesign, etc). Potentially you could even set the keys in the font of your choice. Though, you can bet on your design friends pulling a switch to comic sans prank on your every time you leave your desk.

November 17th, 2011

The McLaren Production Center is located in Woking, Surrey, UK; it was built by Foster + Partners. The 34,500 square meter facility is where all of the McLaren cars are built. The most recently released high-performance car, the MP4-12C is also being assembled here.

The facility is set up for a flexible production. The arrangement of the two-story structure mirrors the flow of the production line: components are delivered; the cars are assembled, painted and tested, and then pass through a rolling road and car wash before leaving the building.

Beneath this floor is a full basement level for storage and plant, and above is a mezzanine floor with views over the production line. Every stage of production takes place under the same roof. Initially it takes 10 days for an MP4-12C to be assembled. During peak production it will be possible to build one of the cars in five days. A new car will join the line every 45 minutes. I had no idea that so many of these cars were sold!

June 8th, 2011

Seeing Steve Jobs these days is a treat. He is truly a man of respect and seeing him present the new Apple headquarters is very enlightening and his presentation is very humble.

Towards the end of the presentation it feels a little strange to see that the members of the City Council seem more concerned about their personal benefits and really don’t have any useful questions. Instead they’re asking for wifi and a potentially unsuccessful store to be placed in Cupertino.

Jobs wants to build one building that holds 12,000 Apple employees on a former Hewlett-Packard property in the area between Tantau North Wolfe, Homestead and the 280.”It’s a little like a spaceship landed,” Jobs says. No kidding.

Jobs begins the presentation referring to the fact that Apple is growing “like a weed,” and that its current campus at D’Anza and the 280 isn’t enough currently — fitting only about 2,800 people. Apple currently rents buildings to house its other 9,200 employees in the area.

Apple purchased about 150 acres from Hewlett Packard, which is now apricot orchards and has corralled some of the “best architects” to come up with a design that puts 12,000 people in one four story high building.

Apple apparently is using its experience building retail stores, and will create a large-scale piece of glass if the proposal goes through. “There’s not a single straight piece of glass in this building,” Jobs says. The parking will be underground.

Jobs also wants the building to function as its own power source, with an “energy center” as its primary source of power (“with natural gas and other ways that are cleaner and cheaper,”), using the grid as a backup.

The campus will also include amenities like its own auditorium similar to Apple’s current town hall (“We’ve got an auditorium, cause we put on presentations, much like we did yesterday but we have to go to San Francisco to do them.”) and a cafeteria that will feed 3,000 people at one sitting.

“We do have a shot at building the best office building in the world,” Jobs told the Council members, “Architecture students will come here to see this.” Ideally Apple wants to move into the campus in 2015.

April 25th, 2011

A dream project for a dream camera. Not only is Black Design Associates connecting to slip an iPhone 4 into a Leica camera body, but they’re taking it to the point of true optical zoom, a dedicated aperture and shutter dials. Awesome.

I’d love to play with this if it comes to fruition. You couldn’t ask for a better stocking stuffer this Christmas… All eyes are on you guys for approval, Apple & Leica.

June 7th, 2010

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The first time I saw the new iPhone via Gizmodo I was very skeptical about the design simply because of the square-ish feel. On top of that I really just wasn’t to accept the change. All of the previous products had these beautiful rounded edges and just felt fluid in your hand. I now see this design as giving the phone more substance. The design to me just feels more modern. I would love to get my hands on this phone and also this house—what a perfect, modern fit.

March 29th, 2010

Hipstamatic Loading screen: “Wiping off lens, please wait.”

The latest and greatest new iPhone app capturing attention is Hipstamatic. The name is a little corny (apparently the real Hipstamatic was a toy camera back in the 80’s), but the app is nowhere near it. Hipstamatic brings with it a sleek interface and unpredictability, combined with a cross-processed and traditional film looks to each photo you take.

The first thing you notice when opening up this application is that the interface is built around the design of the traditional Holga. I think this is very cool and pretty nicely done compared to other photo apps. On top of the design, the ease of use is great. To change lenses, flashes or film, it just takes the swipe of the finger. Purchasing more of the features is very simple as well, but I guess what app isn’t?

The best part about Hipstamatic is that it’s somewhat unpredictable. Especially when you forget how each lens, film, and flash affect the photo. At first I was surprised at how quickly it processed each photo and then saved it. I came to find out that it was because the photos that it was processing were only 480px or so wide and not the full resolution. There is a feature in the settings that can be turned on to “print” larger, but when turning this on the “developing” time is substantially longer. I was also pleasantly surprised at how closely–in some cases–this app mimicked cross-processed film. Of course it still has some work to do to even get close to cross-processed film.

So far I really haven’t had any issues with Hipstamatic to speak of besides enlarging the viewfinder window. I also noticed that my lens/flash/film combination kept on resetting when the app quit on me, two minor issues to a great iPhone application. Overall it’s worth your dollar ninety-nine, two thumbs up to the creator of Hipstamatic.

Continue reading to see more screen shot images of the interface. You can also see the photos I took for my review of Hipstamatic in part 2 here.

October 19th, 2009

The EOS-1D Mark IV is a high-speed performance beast with a 16-megapixel sensor, and Dual DIGIC 4 Processors. The camear shoots at 10 frames per second and is the second camera ever to have ISO expandable to 102400. This new camera also features 1080p HD video at selectable frame rates.

This has been the strangest release in Canon’s history. We–and I’m going to speak for a lot of photographers here when I say this–have been waiting and waiting for Canon to step up the 1d series and tonight they’ve done just that. The Canon 1D Mark IV is the newest and hottest camera on the market.

The 1D Mark IV is scheduled to be available in late December. It’s gonna cost you your next three paychecks–the body is expected to be $4999.00. That’s up about $500 compared to the 1D Mark III price. But you have to expect that when you’re getting that much cameraz-a full HD video capable camera, and a super fast, pro dslr.

Check out these truly amazing samples from over at Vincent Laforet’s blog. He has been testing the camera for some time now.

September 1st, 2009

We wait and wait all year for the camera companies to release new cameras so we can desire the biggest and baddest. Just this morning Canon announced their new addition to the high-end camera line, the EOS 7d. Now, before we get into it here, lets list the facts/specs about the camera:

March 9th, 2009

For the years I’ve been into photography, I’ve never seen a card reader with a great design. I believe that SanDisk has hit on something here with their new multicard readers. The design is more modern than the previous and has a high fashion look to it. Personally I haven’t seen the new card readers, and I’m slightly concerned about the functionality and sturdiness of them. Does anyone have any information on these? What do you think about them and would you make the upgrade?

October 30th, 2008

When I first purchased a set of Pocket Wizards, I thought that the 1600-foot range was a lot, but now that I’ve seen this new trigger I’m starting to see a bunch of new possibilities.

Robert Benson a Californian photographer, has come up with a brilliant trigger by using any normal hand held radio plugged into a camera’s shutter release port. The radio trigger can work up to twenty miles from the camera but it depends on what kind of radio you’re using and the objects in line-of-sight from the camera.

Keep in mind that this device is probably illegal considering the FCC prohibits you from using two-way radios to trigger another device. The device is patent pending and can be purchased here.

Make sure to check out the comments on Robert’s blog post about the triggers. There is some talk of using a cell phone to trigger the camera from possibly…around the world. Think it’s possible?

October 20th, 2008

Photoshop CS4’s new Adjustments panel (Screenshot courtesy Adobe)

Today Adobe has announced the availability of Photoshop CS 4 and the entire Creative Suite 4. It features a tabbed interface, enhanced color correction and non-destructive editing tools. After using Photoshop CS4, I noticed quite a bit of areas where they speed things up. The interface is also much smoother and fluid than CS3.

Here are a list of things to look for in Photoshop CS4:
-Smoother panning and zooming and fluid canvas rotation
-Adjustments panel
-Auto-blending of images
-Improved Adobe Photoshop Lightroom workflow
-Masks panel
-Better raw image processing (for us Photogs)
-Extended depth of field
-Content-Aware Scaling (this is very cool)
-Ability to work with 3D objects with one Click

July 27th, 2008

There have been lots of large-scale events happening in Seattle this week. From the Torchlight Parade to the Capitol Hill Block Party. A quick rundown of what the Block Party is:

“The Capitol Hill Block Party is an annual music festival that draws upon and showcases the best indie and underground rock in the US, with a special focus on Northwest artists. Launched 11 years ago, the Block Party has evolved into one of Seattle’s most anticipated outdoor music festivals. With over 50 bands on 4 stages, great food, and plenty of cheap beer, this is one of the best parties of the summer.”-The Stranger

Here are some Girl Talk songs to listen to while reading the post:

Girl Talk – No Pause (Feed The Animals Album)

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Girl Talk – Play Your Part Pt. 1 (Feed The Animals Album)

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